Faculty News
Recent Grants and Contracts Awarded The following grants and contracts support faculty research at the School of Public Health: The California Senior Leaders Program: Expanding Intergenerational and CrossClass Networks for Sustainability $252,500 from The California Wellness Foundation PI: Meredith Minkler, Dr.P.H.‘75
This project builds on a successful model for promoting senior leadership in healthy aging and community building that was developed by the School of Public Health and implemented with funding from The California Wellness Foundation in 2002, and refined and expanded in 2004. The third round of this program aims to increase the pool and the capacities of diverse California senior leaders in healthy aging and community building and to strengthen the intergenerational and networking components of the project in ways that will help sustain achievements beyond the project period. Effectiveness of Selected Nonpharmaceutical Interventions in Reducing Influenza-like Illness $956,698 from the CDC National Center for Infectious Diseases PI: Tomás J. Aragón, M.D., Dr.P.H. ‘00
This study will measure non-pharmaceutical interventions’ effectiveness in preventing influenza-like illness among a select population in the United States. The experience and results from this study will provide new information on how effective these strategies are in preventing influenza-like illness and the feasibility of implementing these interventions during a human influenza pandemic. Effects of Long-Term Low Level Hydrogen Sulfide Exposure $2,394,142 from the NIH National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences PI: Michael N. Bates, Ph.D. ‘91, M.P.H. ‘89
In New Zealand, the city of Rotorua is situated on a geothermal field, and residents are continuously exposed to 30
University of California, Berkeley
relatively high ambient levels of hydrogen sulfide gas. The hydrogen sulfide is a component of the geothermal emissions coming from the ground around the city. It is highly acutely toxic, but it is unknown whether long-term hydrogen sulfide exposure causes health effects. Because no other large, similarly exposed population exists anywhere, Rotorua provides a unique research opportunity. The Etiology of Successful Aging $567,475 from the NIH National Institute on Aging PI: Shiu-Ping Constance Wang, Ph.D.
This mentored research scientist (K01) award provides five years of intensive research, training, and career development support for assistant researcher Constance Wang. Her research focuses on the application and extension of methods for complex data analysis to identify determinants of healthy aging, with a concentration on developing epidemiologic analytic approaches that produce directly translatable results for policymakers and health promotion practitioners.
Finance and Mental Health Services Training in Czech Republic/Central Europe $1,020,066 from the NIH Fogarty International Center PI: Richard M. Scheffler, Ph.D.
The Fogarty International Center has awarded UC Berkeley a five-year renewal of its joint program with Charles University, Prague, to train outstanding postdoctoral economists, public policy experts, sociologists, clinicians, and mental health professionals from Central Europe in the latest research methods regarding the financing and delivery of mental health services. Fresno Asthmatic Children’s Environment Study $3,950,857 from the NIH National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute PI: Ira B. Tager, M.D., M.P.H.
The study will address an important data gap by continuing a longitudinal cohort study, the Fresno Asthmatic Children’s Environment Study, funded by the California Air Resources Board for the past five years. The overall goal of the study is to determine if children
Faculty News
their review of evidence linking water quality indicators to human health. They will enroll at least 17,600 beach users at one of California’s most contaminated public beaches over three summers. The study will expand water quality indicator testing to include new rapid measuring methods and viral agents from the water samples. Important new statistical methods will also be used to investigate the possibility of important multivariate relationship of these indicators to health. The Influence of Environmental Change on Parasite Diffusion through Human, Invertebrate and Environmental Pathways $1,964,058 from the National Science Foundation PI: Robert C. Spear, Ph.D.
with asthma who have adverse responses to short-term, daily increases in concentrations of ambient air pollutants and bioaerosols are more likely to have increased long-term asthma morbidity and decreased lung function growth. A Genome-Wide Association Study of Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma $2,821,719 from the NIH National Cancer Institute PI: Christine F. Skibola, Ph.D. ‘01
While new therapeutic regimens have begun to delay deaths due to nonHodgkin lymphoma (NHL), causes for the majority of lymphomas remain unknown. In one of the largest casecontrol studies of NHL, Skibola and her team will perform the first genome-wide association study of NHL to identify new disease susceptibility markers. Additionally, they will employ fine-map genotyping to investigate the role of genetic polymorphisms in human leukocyte antigen and other candidate loci in the pathogenesis of NHL.
Graduate Research Training on Alcohol Problems $1,569,465 from the NIH National Institute on Alcohol Abuse & Alcoholism PI: Lee A. Kaskutas, Dr.P.H. ‘92
This award reflects the continuation and evolution of an alcohol training program in operation since 1971, designed to embark trainees on a path of active research in alcohol studies. The essence of the program lies in each trainee’s opportunity to learn from an intensive period of residence and involvement in the research training, research staff, and research activities of Training Program Faculty at the two primary collaborating institutions: the Alcohol Research Group (a National Alcohol Research Center) and the School of Public Health. Indicators of Recreational Water Contamination and Illness $2,138,623 from the NIH/National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences PI: John M. Colford, Jr., M.D., Ph.D. ‘96, M.P.H. ‘92
Colford and his team will use advances in microbiologic techniques and statistical methods to continue
Schistosome parasites diffuse through the environment both within moving hosts and as free-living organisms in waterways. Pathways of parasite diffusion in the environment have gone largely unmeasured, let alone the influence of anthropogenic disturbance on these pathways. This project aims to comprehensively assess the role of diffusion in parasite transmission, with a specific focus on how anthropogenic change can modify diffusion parameters, thereby influencing transmission. Latino Traffic Safety Project $465,000 from the California Office of Traffic Safety PI: David Ragland, Ph.D., M.P.H. ‘80
Traffic injury is a leading cause of death for young Latinos. Over the past three years, the UC Berkeley Traffic Safety Center has conducted the statewide Latino Traffic Safety Project (LTSP) in cooperation with the Tomás Rivera Policy Institute at the University of Southern California. In this third phase of the LTSP, the Traffic Safety Center will work with a local community to implement continued on page 32 Public Health
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Faculty News
Recent Grants and Contracts Awarded, continued
recommendations gathered during the first two phases of the project. They will conduct a process and outcome evaluation of this effort.
Scholars in Health Policy Research Program $6,627,486 from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation PI: John W. Ellwood, Ph.D.
The Right Care at the Right Time: Consumer Communications Project $160,000 from The California HealthCare Foundation PI: Linda Neuhauser, Dr.P.H. ‘88
The School of Public Health training site of the Scholars in Health Policy Research Program has received a fiveyear, $6.6 million award renewal by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to continue offering postdoctoral fellowships in the field of health policy research. This funding brings the total amount awarded by the foundation to the School of Public Health to more than $18 million. The Scholars in Health Policy Research Program is a national program with training sites at UC Berkeley/UC San Francisco; the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor; and Harvard University. The program’s goal is to foster a new generation of creative thinkers and researchers whose work will inform future health policy discussions.
The School’s Health Research for Action (HRA) center will develop a Spanish-language HMO consumer web site and consumer health coverage applications in Spanish and Chinese for the California Department of Managed Health Care (DMCH). This builds on HRA’s previous DMHC contract during the past year to conduct studies with HMO consumers about information needs related to their HMOs and to translate those findings into a redesigned statewide DMHC web site in English.
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University of California, Berkeley
Toxic Substances in the Environment $15,717,177 from the NIH National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences PI: Martyn T. Smith, Ph.D.
The Superfund Basic Research Program consists of six interrelated basic and applied research projects and five core components that provide key project services, such as research translation and training. The overall theme of the program is the application of functional genomics, proteomics, transcriptomics, and nanotechnology to better detect arsenic, mercury, benzene, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, trichloroethylene and other Superfund priority chemicals in the environment; evaluate their effects on human health, especially the health of susceptible populations such as children; and remediate their presence and reduce their toxicity.
Faculty News
Training in Infectious Diseases and Immunity Research $657,295 from the NIH National Institute of Allergy & Infectious Diseases PI: Richard S. Stephens, Ph.D., M.S.P.H.
This award provides five more years of funding for the predoctoral Ph.D. training program in infectious diseases and immunity research established seven years ago to meet the unique and challenging needs for modern research training of individuals with a focus on infectious disease agents. UC Berkeley Academic Geriatric Resource Center $136,350 from the UCOP Academic Geriatric Resource Program PI: Guy Micco, M.D.
This award provides another year of funding for the UC Berkeley Academic
Geriatric Resource Center (AGRC) that has been serving as the central resource and coordination point in geriatric and gerontology education on the UC Berkeley campus since 1985. The center’s primary objective is to gather and disseminate aging-related information to UC Berkeley health care professional students, faculty, staff, health care professionals, and the general public.
health. Selected lecturers, researchers, and students at ABU’s Departments of Public Health and Obstetrics and Gynaecology will be trained and mentored by UC Berkeley faculty and distinguished professors from northern Nigeria. The long-term objective of this five year effort is to create and maintain the Center for Population and Health Research at ABU.
UC Berkeley Global Research Training in Population and Health in Nigeria $711,935 from the NIH Fogarty International Center PI: Malcolm D. Potts, M.B., B.Chir., Ph.D., F.R.C.O.G.
This Fogarty training award will enhance the capacity of two key departments at Ahmadu Bello University (ABU), Zaria, northern Nigeria, to carry out applied research in population
Health Research for Action Publication Receives APHA Honor The American Public Health Association (APHA) Public Health Education and Health Promotion Section awarded the first-place prize in its materials contest to Pennsylvania’s Healthy Steps for Older Adults: A Guide to Preventing Falls, a publication developed and produced by the School’s Health Research for Action center in collaboration with the Pennsylvania Department of Aging. The 64-page guide is part of a Allison Leppke (center), Emory University, representing the Public Health statewide initiative in Pennsylvania intended to prevent falls among older Education and Health Promotion Section of APHA, presents the first-place prize for health education materials to Ivonne Gutiérrez Bucher (left), chief adults. Topics include measuring a person’s risk of falling, how to prevent of staff, Pennsylvania Dept. of Aging, and Linda Neuhauser, co-principal falls, specific exercises that help seniors reduce their risk of falls, and suginvestigator of Health Research for Action at the UC Berkeley School of gested home modifications. Entries from across the nation were judged Public Health. by a panel of health educators and were evaluated based on the quality of the content, appropriateness for the audience, use of health education theory, overall produce quality, innovation and creativity, and their plan for evaluating the success of the product. Health Research for Action co-principal investigator Linda Neuhauser, Dr.P.H. ’88, accepted the prize at the APHA annual meeting in November 2006. Coauthors from the School are Shelley Martin, M.P.H., C.H.E.S., Katherine Simpson, M.A., Marty Martinson, M.Ed., M.P.H.’05, and Wendy Constantine. Coauthors from the Pennsylvania Department of Aging are Ivonne Guierrez Bucher, R.N., M.B.A., and Susan Getgen, R.N.
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